The Power of Not Understanding (Acharei Mot)

The Power of Not Understanding (Acharei Mot)

The way to see by Faith is to shut the Eye of Reason. -Benjamin Franklin

The ancient Rabbis often split up the commandments, the Mitzvot we’ve been given, into two different categories. There are Mishpatim (Mishpat is the singular form), laws that we understand the reasoning behind them and Chukim (Chok is the singular), laws whose underlying reason may escape us.

A Mishpat may be a law as straightforward as don’t steal or don’t murder, which is understandable to most of society. A Chok, is often a more ritual law, which may include the restrictions on what we can or can’t eat, the laws of purification and impurity and anything else that doesn’t follow the logic or purpose of being of clear and direct benefit to either the person performing the commandment or to society as a whole.

A verse in this week’s Torah portion of Acharei Mot references both types of commandments and states that “you will do my Mishpatim and you will guard my Chukim.” The Berdichever explains that there is a direct correlation between the performance of one type of commandment and the other.

If we perform the Chukim, the commandments that we don’t understand, even if we have no rational understanding of the underlying principles and reasons, yet we dutifully perform and uphold God’s law, then we will merit a greater understanding of the Mishpatim, of the more rational commandments.

However, if we don’t follow the Chukim, then we will lose our ability to understand the simpler and more straightforward Mishpatim, the basic laws which most of humanity would agree on.

Modern man has become dismissive of anything that he can’t understand or that contravenes his own personal set of beliefs and values. Faith in God, in tradition, in a divine set of morals has been supplanted by worship of the self, of the ego and the latest passing narcissistic fads of the day. The exercise and the ability to believe in something beyond oneself, beyond the narrow contours of our experience, beyond even our understanding and reason is laughed at.

The Berdichever reinforces an ancient premise that belief in God, belief in the spiritual world, acceptance of the Torah and its precepts can enhance reason. It can open our hearts and our minds to a reality beyond ourselves, to a true, spiritual, supernatural world that cannot be measured by science or social media.

Only once we believe, once we accept, once we perform the Mitzvot, even if we don’t understand them, then and only then, will we start to understand.